Microsoft has today announced the launch of Office on iPad and Android tablets. Not only have they embraced a “mobile-first cloud-first” world, Microsoft has pushed tablet specific versions of their bread and butter Office apps to iPad and Android before their own Surface platform.

In honor of this historic feat, Microsoft stores will offer a free one year Office 365 license to the first 50 people who show up at one of their retail stores Friday 3/28/14 with an iPad. That’s a $99 value, so you’ll want to hurry.

We’re bringing Office, the gold standard in getting things done, to the iPad. A billion people rely on Office every day, and we’ve worked diligently to create a version of Word, Excel and PowerPoint that delivers the best productivity experience available on the iPad. It’s built from the ground up for touch, is unmistakably Office in its design, and is optimized for iPad. Office for iPad offers unmatched rendering of content and delivers unparalleled authoring, analysis and presentation experiences that Office customers expect on all of their devices. Download it today for free.

A: You can download the Office apps for free and read, view and present documents, spreadsheets and presentations. To get the full editing and creation experience, you need an Office 365 subscription. Office 365 gives you always-up-to-date versions of Office across your PC, Mac and iPad, and much more.

Wayne is a diehard Android user and consultant specializing in Sage 100 ERP Accounting Software. He lives in Glastonbury CT with his two children. When not helping them with their homework or pushing the latest school fundraiser off on his co-workers, he is active hiking and investigating all manner of technology.